Cruise In Discussion To Acquire Startup Company Voyage
Sponsored Links
General Motors’ self-driving vehicle company, Cruise, is reportedly in talks to acquire Voyage, a self-driving vehicle startup that provides transportation solutions in retirement communities.
Citing anonymous sources familiar with the matter, Bloomberg reports that Cruise is currently in talks with Voyage over a possible acquisition, although at this point, a deal has yet to be struck. If the acquisition were given a green light, Cruise would bring its software and engineering capabilities to bear in the retirement community market where Voyage currently operates.
Cruise prototypes
“We have nothing to announce but Cruise is always looking to add to our world-class engineering team as we work to solve the greatest engineering challenge of a generation,” said Cruise spokesman Ray Wert.
Based out of Palo Alto, California, Voyage offers low-speed autonomous driving solutions to the elderly in a retirement community in Florida, transporting community members around the retirement facility for a fee. The community includes some 125,000 residents and 750 miles of road, with a hybrid Chrysler Pacifica operating as Voyage’s latest self-driving vehicle.
“This technology can start in calmer communities and towns,” said Voyage co-founder Oliver Cameron in an interview last year. “The capital needed to pull this off is not tiny, but it ain’t billions of dollars and as a result we can continue to be independent.”
Cruise Origin
By contrast, Cruise’s ambitions are far greater in scope, with plans to offer self-driving vehicles worldwide, including in urban environments and commercial solutions. General Motors acquired Cruise in March of 2016, and the company revealed its first production-bound driverless vehicle, Cruise Origin, in January of 2020. Roughly sized like a tradition crossover utility vehicle, Cruise Origin includes two opposing bench seats inside the cabin, with screens mounted on the ceiling providing passengers with vital information like the trip itinerary. Cruise Origin utilizes an all-electric powertrain for motivation.
Back in January of this year, Honda announced that it would leverage its development and commercial agreements with General Motors to deploy Cruise autonomous vehicles as part of its new autonomous vehicle mobility service business in Japan.
Subscribe to GM Authority for more Cruise news, GM engineering and technology news, and around-the-clock GM news coverage.
Sponsored Links
Maybe Mary should buy oil wells instead of all this EV crap?
Liberalism is cancer. EVs are tumors. Patriots are the cure.
There must be some major synergies for Voyage to join with Cruise, and I believe there is. Both have autonomous vehicle (AV) knowhow and assets that can substantially benefit both for this.
Voyage knows the retirement community market and already operates in it. Cruise has the AV technology that surely can be quickly made to work well for retirement communities everywhere.
Cruise should be manufacturing the Origin by Xmas next year and, most likely, it should be the AV of choice for moving people around gated communities. Should Voyage and Cruise join, getting Origin AVs earlier and in bigger numbers must be a no brainer.
AVs require a better presence. What could be a better early presence than having thousands of AVs moving residents around their communities?
Of course, residents in gated communities need and want to travel beyond their boundary gates. Enabling community AVs to do this for residents would be a huge obvious must do for Voyage and Cruise.